Confession

Sometimes confession is a private thing, sometimes a public thing. I believe that in this situation public confession is required. You see, I have a problem, and I need help and accountability for that problem. I need you, my brothers and sisters, to walk me through this difficult [holiday] season of my life. So here is my confession.

Many are the stresses and pressures in a person's life. The burden to perform and to succeed is so great that it often leads us to make poor choices. While not making excuses for my actions I do feel it necessary to lay blame at the feet of a liberally biased media as others in need of confession have also done in recent days. Certain persons in said media have felt it necessary to begin playing Christmas music already. In fact, some stations have begun pumping out the holiday cheer 24/7. This is obviously a gross aberration and completely inexcusable. Their glorification of one holiday over another is so devastating and it is certainly the lesser holidays such as Thanksgiving that suffer most.

Add to that the fact that it is impossible to walk into any commercial establishment on the planet and not be overcome by red and green and silver bells and all that stuff and it is no wonder that I have found myself in the situation I am in today.

And so here is my confession...I have spent the entire morning listening to Christmas music. It started off innocently enough. An accidental brush of the radio led to the self-proclaimed local Christmas station where I paused a little too long. The next thing you know I'm rationalizing as any addict would. It would just be one song. Nobody would even know. Oh, but the next one is so good too and soon I can't stop. And now I have given in fully to this vice. I'm sitting here in my song-induced stupor. So much so that I'm swaying as Bing sings about that Holy Night right this very minute. I know how this will hurt those around me. I know that soon all this holiday cheer will make me irritable and unapproachable. I know that a month from now I'll be drowning in a sea of over-played, beat into the ground Christmas music, and yet I can't stop. Eleven months of Christmas-music sobriety is down the tubes just like that.

So...please keep my family and friends in your thoughts as we walk through this difficult time together. I will be seeking immediate intervention as I attempt to break the stranglehold of consumerism I find myself in. But until that time, Deck the Halls and Ring those Bells and Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!